While Clair Obscur: Expedition 33's publisher has poked fun at the Barbenheimer-esque situation between its own stellar JRPG and the Oblivion Remaster, it doesn't seem like it's harmed Sandfall's hit at all. Clair Obscur landed very well, gathering over 1 million sales in under a week and an all-timer critical reception.
In a recent interview with The Game Business, senior portfolio director Matt Handrahan at Kepler says he's pretty sure that's down to Expedition 33 having something special to offer gamers, because hey, turns out they're also two very different games:
"We always knew that Expedition 33 had a very specific identity," Handrahan says, "When I was in the press, I saw the Western-style RPG and the Japanese-style RPG as having quite different appeals and audiences. I knew plenty of people that would play an Elder Scrolls game that wouldn't necessarily play Final Fantasy and vice versa."
Which is fair enough. RPGs and JRPGs are very different beasts. While the differentiation between the genres has been one of debate (and some controversy), it's very much a 'you know it when you see it' situation. Bethesda's catalogue has a very different set of mechanics when compared to your Personas and Final Fantasies.
Especially since "Western-style" RPGs have leant further and further away from turn-based combat. Both due to mistaken genre conventions that haven't really borne out, but also thanks to their roots in the CRPG's penchant for real-time pause and the like. If we're comparing JRPGs to Bethesda RPGs specifically, the narrative experience is completely different, too.
"I think there were other aspects," Handrahan adds. "Like the price point we were at and the inclusion in Game Pass … so we knew we would have a lot of interest around the game. We were confident in that.
"Actually," he continues, "Proximity to Oblivion didn't seem to harm us at all. In many ways, I think it just drew attention to quality RPGs that week and everybody was thinking and talking about the genre."
While shadow-dropped games can absolutely cause major issues for smaller developers, I'm personally glad Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 managed to squeeze its way into the gaps left by the Oblivion Remaster. It's certainly a game that deserves the attention, having swallowed 60+ hours of my attention into a time vortex last week.
I think Handrahan's bang on the money here, too—to the point where he's almost stating the obvious. Ol' 33 and Oblivion Remastered are both extremely different games with different core audiences. That's not to say there isn't some overlap, but the charming jank and open world of Bethesda's classic is a complete apple when compared to the orange of Clair Obscur's mind-bending, tightly-written plot and strict narrative. The town of the gaming industry was, in fact, big enough for the two of them.
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